RECAP: 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 2 — “When the Boeing Gets Tough”

9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 2 is titled “When the Boeing Gets Tough,” and, well, it lives up to its title. Not only is Athena having a bad day, but the episode itself struggles to find its footing as a middle story in a three-part disaster arc.

The Athena (Angela Bassett) and Dennis (Glenn Plummer) moments shine brightest. A flashback to Emmett’s funeral reminds us of the immediate fallout from Emmett’s death. We also get caught up with Dennis, who explains that authorities came to him with the deal to befriend Maxwell Fulton in exchange for an early release. The reason that people are trying to kill him is that Maxwell told him the information about where “his library” is, presumably a file of his victims, though it’s unclear if that’s really what it is or if there’s something else these men in suits want from Dennis.

Dennis also revealed to Athena that he’ll testify in coorperation but he’s not taking the deal without Athena’s blessing. Again, Dennis is saying all the right things but he’s still putting a lot of the emotional turmoil on Athena. What is she supposed to do? Let Dennis finish his sentence even though he helped in a major federal case? Or will recognizing Dennis’ remorse be enough for her to grant her blessing? Before she can answer that for herself, the bee-nado intervenes.

Like during most disaster arcs, the episode starts slightly before the main accident so that we can get familiar with our major plane emergency players. Along with Athena and Dennis, there’s young Jim, who knows a lot about planes, but then there’s an assortment of characters that get a lot of screen time but no good narrative power.

That’s the biggest issue with 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 2. There’s a lot of focus on the many emergencies happening on the plane. Fair enough, but each successful rescue lacks the emotional punch it’s going for because the plane passengers don’t get a lot of build up.

One of the greatest things 9-1-1 does is make you care about the people the firefighters and paramedics are saving. Often this is done in as little as two minutes of screen time. Yet, 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 2 hurries past these character introductions which leads to anti-climatic rescues. Part of that issue also comes from having the entire 118 talking to the plane passengers on the phone for the entire episode.

Remember Season 2’s earthquake arc? It’s on par with the tsunami arc in terms of the show’s best disasters because it takes a lot of time to set-up and showcase each major character in the earthquake rescue so that watching them go through these traumatic moments holds more weight. In fact, the show does this so well that in the Season 6 finale, they bring back an earthquake victim that Bobby and the 118 rescued to assit in the 118’s own rescue.

The earthquake arc also puts the entire 118 into action. Buck and Eddie, new partners just over their rocky start, have to work together to make their way up a leaning skyscraper to rescue people at the very top. Hen goes off on her own to rescue a little girl and watches a fellow firefighter die in the process. Bobby and Chimney help out Jeff the basketball player.

But the 118’s not really in action in 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 2. They’re just on their phones, talking the characters we don’t really have any investment in through rescue procedures. It’s actually similar to 9-1-1 Lone Star’s Season 3 Episode 8 in which TK and Owen experience a mid-flight emergency and Tommy and Nancy have to talk TK through a rescue over the phone. But in that case, there was much more emotional weight behind the characters because we already knew them so well. Even the person TK is trying to save gets a brief moment of introduction that is enough to make us care about her. The rescue itself informed the journey TK was going through at the time.

In the case of “When the Boeing Gets Tough,” character’s backstories are randomly thrown out there in the middle of the rescues as a way but there’s too much action to really register each one and why that means we should care about them.

Even Athena’s inability to get a hold of Bobby rings hollow when the couple went through a similar situation just last season during the cruise ship arc, an arc that included much higher stakes in terms of the turmoil Athena and Bobby were going through. Dennis sort of plays that role this time around, but Athena hasn’t had a lot of time to process what Dennis is telling her before everything starts to happen, placing this important character dynamic a bit on the back burner. Though, it is cool to see Athena take control of the plane. Having young Jim step in as her copilot was probably the best use of one of the day players for this particular rescue.

While having the 118 talk on the phones all episode left a lot to be desired, having Dennis actively involved in a rescue while Chimney talks him through resetting a person bone showed a lot to Dennis’ character. That’s the complicated kind of character stuff I’m here for. Because it’s one thing to hear Dennis’ remorse, but it’s another thing to see him in action as a decent human being who did a horrible thing. Whether this has any effect on Athena’s decision remains to be seen but it’s certainly a complicated one.

Bobby’s boredom on the set on ‘Hotshots’ gets increasingly funnier with each scene, especially considering one of the scenes they filmed this episode happened to be a similar rescue Eddie, Buck, Ravi did last season. The meta-ness keeps building!

The fallout from Buck saving Gerrard’s life is short yet there’s some interesting plot threads developing. Buck’s distress over the fact that he actually wanted to hit Gerrard instead of saving him is going to be a really interesting throughline to follow. Buck hasn’t been known to be a violent person but his urgent confusion on the situation could also harken back to last season when his jealousy led to him accidentally hurting Eddie. Not enough has happened here yet to get a good read on Buck’s emotional state but this would be an interesting avenue to revisit.

Despite the episode’s lackluster mid-flight rescues, that doesn’t mean that Bobby and Buck stealing a firetruck together to save Athena isn’t exhilarating. My oh my, how thing’s have changed since the pilot. Plus, Bobby’s new shadow Brad, the star of ‘Hotshots,’ hops in for a ride along to get the ultimate Bobby Nash hero experience. Who’s to say what role any of them can step into from the ground but it’s bound to be interesting with a weird actor tagging along.

By episode’s end, it seems like everything’s okay despite there being a hole in the back of the plane. But the original copilot is finally awake, or so it seems. Just as he says he’s good to take back over the plane, he seemingly has a heart attack. This cliffhanger could spell the perfect opportunity to really go all Airport 1975 and have Tommy come in to support via helicopter.

Tommy did play a part in the rescue of Athena and Bobby last season, so it’s not out of the realm of possibility, though perhaps a tad repetitive. Still, a flight instructor only got them so far, and Tommy’s the only other character we know who can fly a plane and a helicopter. Whatever happens, Bobby and Athena better have the biggest reunion of their lives, and then maybe retire for good, because god knows they can’t go anywhere without something happening.

While 9-1-1 Season 8 Episode 2 doesn’t live up to the premiere, it also had the difficult job of transitioning from the bee-nado emergency to this plane emergency. It’s definitely a whiplash, but it sets the tone for the final part next week.

9-1-1 airs new episodes every Thursday.